


and it’s as if the stone is shattering beneath me

by mermistia



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Blood, Character Death, Episode: s03 Miraculeur | Miraculer, Gen, not TECHNICALLY love square but he pines abt her so it counts shut up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-14
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2021-01-30 09:57:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21426346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mermistia/pseuds/mermistia
Summary: Adrien is facing death. Alone. (Or, almost alone.)He didn’t think it would end like this.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Plagg, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 8
Kudos: 120





	and it’s as if the stone is shattering beneath me

**Author's Note:**

> okay so i wrote most of this just after miraculer aired but never finished it bc im gay and dumb but who cares bc now here we are!

He’s limping. 

He’s sure he’s limping, and he’s sure he can feel people staring, eyes watching him even though there’s no one there on the street.

It’s like the floor is spinning, and although Adrien knows that it’s flat and sturdy and just the same as it’s always been, he looks down in a mild, dulled kind of concern, wondering if Miraculer has cataclysmed the ground, wondering if the sidewalk is shattering beneath his feet. 

She hasn’t. 

It’s not. 

He breathes out slowly and palms the wall, and Plagg’s voice rings in his ears, quiet and in pain. “_Sit._”

He thinks that that’s a good idea. 

His feet are stumbling, tripping over pebbles and trash and themselves, sending him flying forwards before he stops himself, slamming against walls repeatedly. Shouting out for her is useless. She’s not there. She can’t hear him. He knows that. But he calls out anyway, soft and broken and raspy, as if the empty street will hear his pleas and bring her to him. As if she’s there to save him. 

“Ladybug...”

“_She can’t hear you, kid._” Plagg sounds just as tired as Adrien feels. He can’t even _see_ the kwami, but Plagg’s pain pulses from the ring like energy, sending shocks through Adrien’s every nerve. “_She’s not here. You need to sit._”

Neither of them say anything more, their heads spinning too wildly to form words as Adrien turns a corner, squishing himself into a gap between buildings. The walls are much too close together for his liking, much too small and almost like a trap, and he wonders vaguely if Miraculer planned all of this, if she’s watching him, ready to throw herself from the rooftops and land in front of him and take everything from him while he’s stuck, helpless on the ground. 

“_I don’t think she knows where you are._”

“We can’t be sure.”

“_You’ll have to be,_” Plagg says in his ear, and groans as a wave of pain overtakes him. 

Adrien presses his feet against the wall, stretching out as much as he can in the short space. “What now?” he begins, and coughs as the words send a stabbing pain through his ribs, travelling over his chest and into his arms. “Plagg-”

“_Detransform._”

He blinks. “Miraculer- what if she’s here- what if someone sees me- Plagg, I can’t- _no._” he cuts off with a yelp as more pain shoots through him, like his body is falling apart, and gives a short nod that he isn’t sure the kwami can even see. 

“Plagg, claws in.” Adrien’s throat tightens with the words, and he squeezes his eyes shut as the burst of green light flashes over his body. He winces at the short pressure on his stomach as his kwami collapses on top of him, his hand twitching towards the pain, but doesn’t say anything as Plagg blinks up at him wearily, green eyes seeming slightly darker. 

“So, that’s what it feels like to get cataclysmed. I promise I’ll never call the dinosaurs a bunch of wusses ever again.”

Adrien reaches for his jacket, fingers sliding over the material as he fumbles for a grip. “Plagg,” he says, and he feels his head sinking forwards as his consciousness wavers. “Grab some camembert in my jacket.” He takes a shaky breath as Plagg moves his head, the small change in position setting off sparks of fresh pain. “We’ll rest for a while ‘til Ladybug comes back.”

“Can’t move that far,” Plagg murmurs, and curls himself into a ball instead, tucking his ears flat against his head. 

Adrien gives him a weak smile, and a laugh that turns into a series of retching coughs. “Not even for camembert? Who are you, and what have you done with Plagg?”

Plagg peeks out from his ball to give him a half-hearted glare, ears wiggling in vague annoyance. “We’re dying, Adrien. Not a great time for jokes.”

“That’s the _best_ time for jokes,” Adrien says, his grin getting a little wider, and then the reality of what Plagg just said hits him full in the face, a shock reminder of the intense pain that his body had almost tricked itself into forgetting about. 

_We’re dying, Adrien._

_We’re dying._

_Dying._

He didn’t think he’d die like this. 

He hadn’t considered that he was going to die at _all._

It can’t be true. It’s too much, too scary, too _much,_ and he doesn’t want it to be true. 

“Am I really going to die?”

Plagg seems to realise his mistake, and his eyes widen as he backtracks over his words, tail flicking. “No, we- I mean, I don’t _think_ we- ah, no. I don’t know. I’m in too much- too much pain to think. I really don’t want to lie to you.”

“I’m only fifteen,” Adrien whispers. His eyes start to sting with tears, and he lets his head fall back against the wall. There’s so much he hasn’t seen, so much he hasn’t done, and now he’s going to die before he gets the chance. The chance to leave home. The chance to see the world. The chance to kiss Ladybug’s lips, soft and real and true and not only to defeat an akuma. He’s never going to have the chance to tell her everything he’s ever wanted to say, to let out of his soul everything that he’s ever wanted to tell the girl with the blue eyes and the blue hair and the most beautiful smile he’s ever seen, the girl that he’s so hopelessly hopelessly in love with. “I don’t want to die.”

Plagg sits up with a groan of effort, and looks up at him with wide eyes. “Kid, who does? We’ll be fine, though. Your Lady’ll find us.”

Adrien doesn’t have the heart or energy to point out that even if Ladybug did come looking for Chat Noir, he’s currently detransformed and tucked away inside a cramped alley, hidden from outside view. Ladybug isn’t going to find him. He knows that. He’s on his way to accepting it. He’s going to die here, curled up and hidden away in an alley, his kwami peacefully sleeping in a permanent doze on his chest. He can almost see himself as he imagines it happening, he can see his own green eyes crying and fading and closing as the cataclysm eats away at him from the inside out, slowly but surely. 

He doesn’t think he can bear the thought any longer. 

“I don’t like it here,” he says softly, and slides a hand along the floor. “I don’t want to look at it anymore.” 

“Then don’t,” Plagg says, tucking himself back into a ball. 

“Can’t argue with that.” He lets his eyes fall closed, still tracing the patterns of the floor with one hand, running his fingers gently over the cold stone. It seems like it’s freezing and breaking under his touch, and he opens just one eye to look at it, peering curiously through his rapidly blurring vision. Everything looks normal. Everything _is_ normal, he supposes. He knows that the world won’t fall apart without him. The world will continue on. It always does. Everything will still be normal, even without Chat Noir, even without him. Everyone will be okay without him. They’ll still have Ladybug, after all. Rena Rouge, Carapace, and maybe even Queen Bee there to protect them all. 

It’s a sad thought as much as it is a happy one. 

He’s glad that they’d be okay. 

But it hurts, feeling so broken. 

Useless. 

Irrelevant. 

R e p l a c a b l e .

They don’t need him. 

Not really. 

Ladybug doesn’t need him. 

He doesn’t think that she ever has. 

Half of him knows that that’s not true, or at least he hopes that it isn’t. He wants Ladybug to need him. He wants her to love him, to love him, to love him, to press her mouth against his and hold him close and guide him through the dark, to smile with a smile that’s reserved only for him as she grips his hand tight and swings them through the sky. 

He wants to be needed. 

He wants to be wanted. 

He wants to be _loved._

He doesn’t want to die. 

He shifts his position just slightly, moving his arm into a more comfortable position as he leans to the side and coughs up blood, plastering the ground in sticky red liquid as he chokes on it all. “_Plagg-_”

“It’s okay, Adrien,” and Plagg’s voice is so soothing that Adrien almost believes him. His hand slips, sliding forwards through the blood and creating angry red handprints in front of him, and he hurriedly wipes it on his shirt with what little energy he has left. 

“Bleeding,” Adrien says, wiping a hand across his mouth, and he lets his body slump down the wall a little further. Plagg either didn’t hear him or just can’t be bothered responding, and Adrien realises with dull surprise that he doesn’t really care very much about getting an answer anyway. An answer would just keep the conversation going, and he’s too tired for conversation right now. His eyes are too heavy, his hands are too weak, and he’s so very tired. “I want to sleep.”

“Me too,” Plagg says, ears twitching, sleep creeping into his voice. “Wanna sleep together?”

“Don’t have a pillow,” Adrien says, but his mind is already starting to black out, his eyes dropping closed, and he doesn’t really mind the lack of comfort. “G’night, Plagg.”

“Goodnight, kid.” Plagg’s voice breaks around the words, the sound coming out as more of a croak, but Adrien ignores it, letting the desperate need for sleep take over his body. 

His eyes flutter closed. 

His breathing slows. 

The rise and fall of his chest comes to a stop. 

His hand goes limp, and suddenly

suddenly

s

u

d

d

e

n

l

y

he’s gone.

**Author's Note:**

> oh god oh fuck i killed my son
> 
> (i’m @mermistia on tumblr if u want to follow for possible updates abt when i’m NEXT going to kill my son)


End file.
